cgi...3d
again two tags referring to the same thing <_<
almost... computer generated imagery is frequently used to quickly generate a lot of 2D stuff.. explosions.. flames, anything that animator should not really be bothered to do.
Wait, am i saying that nearly all posts are CGI?
well, yes.. if a 2d artist adds a computer generated glare..
..
..
Anyway 3D and CGI tags currently mean the same thing.. and umm It shouldn't be? yes?

By the most literal definition, CGI is anything that is rendered by computers.

But I almost always see it used nowadays to reference special effects that are used in movies.

Dragonlayer said:
But I almost always see it used nowadays to reference special effects that are used in movies.

Really? The general term that I see most often is VFX. CGI is anything computer generated (VFX can fall under that), while 3D tends to refer to just 3D modeling/animation/rendering.

I think 3D should imply CGI for tagging purposes

TheHuskyK9 said:
I think 3D should imply CGI for tagging purposes

+1.
Special effects are often 3d-rendered but don't have to be (eg. there are plenty of 2d particle-effect engines. Some of the flash posts we have use particle effects, though usually not heavily.)

So the CGI wiki page is incorrect.

aurel said:
like glares, these bubbles (maybe just a bubble brush) , these flames and light effects (obvious CGI) , light rays (maybe, could have been done either way) ... or anything that we think was computer generated using algorithms.

That seems like.. I dunno, 'obvious_filter'?
I wouldn't mind something like that for blacklisting purposes, personally.

The subjectivity of 'obvious' is a bit of a problem for such a tag. All fractals are CGI, but if you don't know fractals are a thing, not all fractals are obviously CGI. Stacking multiple filters also tends to obfuscate what is actually happening a lot.

I wouldn't want to use just 'CGI' as the tag name, even though it's technically correct; as you point out in OP, it is not actually being used in a technically correct way (and that's unlikely to change)